Posts tagged Sheldon Leonard

Recognize the man pictured above? His name is mentioned on netwrok television every week?

Hello Everybody. Joe Morella and Frank Segers back again with more musings on the Hollywood of the past.

Back in the 20′s, 30′s and 40′s when a star’s career was on the wane he took to Broadway or summer stock. In later years he took to television. AND, actors who’d never quite made it big in features (Milton Berle, Jackie Gleason, Raymond Burr, Danny Thomas etc) moved to TV to flourish.

Our mug, often a gangster in films, took to television, but as a producer. He teamed with Thomas and created some of early TV’s hit comedies. The writer’s and producer’s of the current hit,”The Big Bang” paid homage to him by naming their two lead characters Sheldon and Leonard.

YESTERDAY’S PIC: That was singer Allan Jones and his then wife actress Irene Hervey in a never seen before photo from Donald Gordon’s collection. They are the parents of singer Jack Jones. Hervey started her career at MGM but spent most of her film years at Universal. She’s the other woman to Dietrich in “Destry Rides Again.” Jones, too, left MGM for Universal. He’d starred with Irene Dunne in the first sound version of “Show Boat.” But he’s perhaps best remembered for his roles in the Marx Brothers comedies, “A Night at the Opera,” and “A Day at the Races.”